


For a Good Time Call

by blue_pointer



Series: Only in Manhattan [3]
Category: Ant-Man (Movies), Captain America (Movies), Ghostbusters (2016), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Beer, Bucky thoughts, Comedy, Crossover, Crossovers & Fandom Fusions, Friendship, Gen, Hijinks & Shenanigans, Pining Steve Rogers, Pizza, Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Queer Themes, Spoilers, Stucky - Freeform, Therapy, post-Ghostbusters, the ghost of stony
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-27
Updated: 2016-10-27
Packaged: 2018-08-27 07:05:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,909
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8391940
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blue_pointer/pseuds/blue_pointer
Summary: Steve and Sam sit down to try and formulate a plan of action to get Thor back. Sam suggests their best bet is to use their lifeline and call a friend. They come up with a few who might be able to help. The comedic chaos at Ladder 8 continues. Steve and Sam briefly question Holtzmann about the events of last summer. Nat reads Steve for filth. Kevin shares beer.





	

**Author's Note:**

> This is crack that accidentally turned into post-Civil War realness. I hope that's cool with you guys.

 

“Okay, so what do we know right now? Let’s lay out all the facts.” Sam and Steve were sitting in the out-of-place living room area that existed between the front door and Holtzmann’s work area. The chairs were surprisingly comfortable.

“Oo! I can get a whiteboard,” Erin volunteered.

“Thanks, but uh…” Sam favored her with his killer smile. “We’re not really that formal.”

“Oh. Okay.” She nodded, eager to be part of the conversation. Steve sipped coffee out of a mug with the Statue of Liberty on the side. It wasn’t Tony’s coffee, but he’d had worse.

“Hey, Erin?” Abby was calling her from the stairs. “ERIN!” She had a startling way of projecting her voice when she was being ignored.

“Oh, what?” Erin turned to face her wearing the slightly vacant smile she’d been treating Steve to all morning.

“Can you come upstairs for a sec, I need your help with something.”

“But I was…” Erin pointed at Steve and Sam. “I’m helping.”

“Please? It’s really important,” Abby ground out. She wasn’t subtle, but it seemed like that was the only way to get the job done around here. Steve watched as Erin followed her, turning to smile and wave at him just in time to run into one of the big columns on her way.

She laughed and tried to play it off. “That’s not real blood,” she said, wiping her teeth. “I just. Ate some ketchup earlier.” Sam waved at her as she took the longest possible time climbing the stairs, trying to look at Steve all the way. Then he turned back to Steve.

“Well, we know that this guy has to be Thor.”

“Do we? I mean, what proof is there, apart from the fact he really looks like the guy?”

“Well, he recognized me on the train,” Steve said.

“You sure? Cause by my count, he hasn’t used your name once since we’ve been here. And look, I know people _think_ Odinson’s just some big dumb dude, but he is not.”

“Agreed.”

“So where does that leave us?”

“Sam.” Steve smiled in that way he used when he had to be right. “You honestly think a guy can look that much like Thor and not be him? If he’s not, where’s he been all this time?”

Sam shrugged. “Outer space somewhere? I don’t know where the dude goes, but that don’t mean he’s playing secretary in Tribeca.”

Steve leaned forward in his chair. “Okay, but what IF. We can’t take the chance this guy is Thor with memory loss or under some Asgardian spell or something.”

“Okay, agreed. I just think we need more info on the whole thing.”

Steve just stared at him. Most of the time he was glad Sam played devil’s advocate. It was easy for Steve to get carried away with his ideas. But sometimes, he just wanted to go, go, go, and Sam was like the open parachute holding him back. “How do we do that?”

“Well, for starters, you talk to any of these ladies about him? Like if he ever summons lightning or flies through the air?”

“Very funny.” Steve watched as Thor-who-was-called- Kevin walked over to the coffee maker, poured himself a cup, took a sip, and promptly spit it back into the pitcher. He slowly put his mug on the floor.

“I’m serious, Steve. We don’t need Nat here to gather intel. Pretty sure just you and me can get the job done.”

“Have _you_ tried talkin to these ladies?” Because Steve had had a helluva time trying to get a word in edgewise all day.

“Yeah, have you?” Holtzmann popped up behind the wing-backed chair Sam was perched on. “I hear they’re real women. With vaginas and everything.” Steve made a face. People didn’t say words like that aloud in his day.   

“You don’t say?” Sam looked back at her, playing along.

She shrugged. “I heard a rumor.”

Sam smiled. “So, hey, as long as you’re here, can you tell us, have you ever noticed anything strange about Kevin?”

“You mean...besides the glasses?”

“Yeah.” Steve decided he could participate now that they were no longer talking female anatomy. “Besides the glasses, the eye-hearing thing, the coffee--we’re not talkin about little quirks. We mean, like…”

“Like supernatural phenomena?” Holtzmann’s eyes lit up.

“Yeah, like that.”

Her eyes narrowed. “Are we counting the time he was possessed by a class 7 bent on facilitating the Apocalypse?”

“I would think so,” Sam nodded. “Yeah.”

“Well that really wasn’t Kevin’s fault.” She started to pick her teeth with a screwdriver. “He was just kind of in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

“Are you telling about the time I saved the world?” Kevin wandered over, wearing the largest pair of bunny slippers Steve had ever seen. He looked at Sam.

“Kev, for the last time, coming to and pushing a bunch of buttons on a power box did not close the vortex.”

“You don’t have to thank me,” he told her condescendingly. “We’re still friends, even if you can’t admit it.” Holtzmann made a comic noise of frustration and rolled back to her work area. Kevin smiled at Sam and Steve.

“There was a vortex?” Sam asked in disbelief.

“Yeah, in uh...midtown,” Kevin said, rubbing one eye through his glasses frames. “But don’t worry. I closed it.”

“With your powers?” Steve asked, prompting.

“Powers?” Kevin seemed to consider this, striking a modeling pose. “Nah, I lost those after the ghost left.”

“Wait, wait,” Sam cut in before Steve could say ‘I told you so.’ “So you had powers...but then you lost your powers?”

“I guess so.” Kevin smiled proudly, as though he’d just passed a test.

“What did the ghost look like?” Steve asked. “The one who took your powers.”

“Ah.” Kevin brightened, gesturing for them to wait. He returned with a laptop, pressed a few buttons, and presented them with a tablet drawing of...a cartoon ghost with giant breasts? Steve’s jaw dropped. Sam had to hold his breath to keep from laughing. “Like that,” Kevin told them. “Only...the boobs were much smaller.” He examined the artwork, considering, then nodded.  

Sam wanted to go on asking questions, but his body was shaking with the need to laugh. It only got worse when Steve turned to him with that look of a frustrated 90-year-old man.

“Hey, y’all, pizza’s here!” Patty called out from behind them. She strode over to Steve and handed him three boxes with a wide smile. “Those are just for you, Cap. I read that People magazine article where you said you eat way more than the average person.” She tapped one of her temples. “Patty remembers everything.”

“Jee, thanks.” The pizza smelled pretty good, too. Steve suddenly realized he was starving.

“I got somethin for you, too, Peaches,” she told Sam, handing him a single box.

There was a cry from above. “Oh, thank God!” and Abby came sliding down the pole. Almost. Somehow, she managed to get stuck about halfway down. “Dammit! Not again.”

Suddenly she was being bombarded with crumpled-up pieces of paper. “What the hell, Kev?” Patty turned around from setting the rest of the pizzas on their workbench.

“Don’t worry. This is how I get Mike Hat down whenever he’s stuck in a tree.”

“Your dog gets stuck in trees?” Abby couldn’t resist asking as she was stranded about ten feet up.

“Yeah, he loves eating the leaves.” Abby’s eyes narrowed.

“Oh, hi!” Erin appeared at the bottom of the stairs. “Who threw the party?”

Steve just shook his head and started eating his first pizza. “See what I mean?” he said to Sam.

“Vaginas,” Holtzmann rolled by on her hoverboard. “Every time.” Steve hid his face behind the lid of the pizza box. He was starting to suspect she said it just to make him blush.

Sam opened his own pizza box and came over to whisper to Steve behind their lids. “Okay, so here’s what I think: we can’t risk it.”

“Like I said.”

“Seconded. So who can we contact who’ll help us figure out if he’s really Thor or not, and how to get him back to normal?”

Steve just returned an anguished look.

“Okay, who else?”

“Wanda did mind control back for Ultron,” Steve said.

“Yeah, but didn’t she have Loki’s sceptre to boost her power then?”

Steve thought back. “Not sure.” She certainly hadn’t done anything so villain-like since. But maybe she still could.

“Okay, you give Clint a call. I’m gonna dig up that emergency number I have for Tic Tac.”

Steve’s eyes widened. “Hank Pym.”

Sam nodded. “He’s like the anti-Tony, right? Man, don’t look at me like that.”

“Sorry.”

“We need to talk later. Like for real talk.”

Steve sighed, having known it was inevitable. “Okay, but crisis first?”

Sam gave him a look. “Yeah, as usual, saved by the crisis.” He glanced over at Erin and Patty trying to talk Abby down off the pole while Kevin continued to throw paper at her, and Holtzmann carried out a bucket of what might have been liquid nitrogen. “You better go upstairs to make that call.”

“Good idea.” Steve grabbed his pizza and took the steps three at a time to the third floor. The second had a number of troubling warning signs everywhere.

Laura answered the phone. “Barton residence.”

“Hi, Laura, it’s me, St--”

“Hold on, I’ll get him.” He could hear her talking to the kids in the background. Steve ate more pizza while he was waiting. He envied Clint that quiet family life. It was something he’d never have.

“Howdy, stranger,” Clint picked up the phone. “I thought you weren’t gonna call here. To protect the kid.”

“I wouldn’t do it unless it was an emergency,” Steve explained. And he gave Clint a quick run-down of the facts.

“You know,” Clint said. “It’d be worth coming out just to see the big guy in modern clothing.”

“It is weird,” Steve admitted. “He cut his hair, too.”

“NO way. Okay, you have to send me a picture.”

“I don’t think this phone takes pictures,” Steve said. Not that he was the one to ask.

“So, you want me to run the idea past her?”

“It’s probably better coming from you anyway.”

“Sure.”

“But I think if we try it, we’d better come there. I don’t want either of you getting stopped at the airport.”

“You won’t?” Clint asked pointedly.

“Sam and I have other options. But I think we’re gonna try and track down Pym first.”

“Pym?”

“Yeah, Scott’s boss?”

“Oh, that old guy who looks like the actor from _Fatal Attraction_?”

“I didn’t like that movie.” Steve frowns. “Wait, he does?”

“Well, you meet him and let me know.”

“Will do. So...follow-up in a couple o’ days?”

“Yeah. I’ll have her call if she has questions.”

“Sounds good.”

He was just about to hang up. “Hey--Steve?”

“Yeah.”

“Be careful, huh? If Thor’s head is this messed-up...you-know-who’s probably not far behind.”

“Damn.” The thought had already occurred to Steve, but he was trying really hard not to go there yet. “I hope not.”

“Watch your back.”

“Understood.” After he hung up, Steve just took several minutes to enjoy the peace and quiet and devour his pizza.

“Guess she made the right choice for your order,” Sam observed, coming in to stand behind him. “How’d it go?”

“Sausage and pepperoni.” Steve nodded. “There’s no slice like a New York slice.”

“Careful, Cap, you might start to sound like a hipster.”

“A what?”

“Nevermind. Here.” He handed Steve a matchbook. “Found the number.” Steve held it up, giving Sam a strange look over the bar mascot, which seemed to be a mudflap girl. “Hey, I met that contact in a bar. You know that one took some doing.”

“Shouldn’t you call then?”

“Who, me? Naw.” Sam shook his head. “Me and Tic Tac got history. ‘Sides, the dude worships you. He’d do anything you told him to.” Steve sighed. He should really be used to that by now. “You want me to grab you a drink to wash down all that pizza?”

“Just a glass of water.” Steve looked up at him and smiled, tired. It had been a long long day.

“You got it.” As Sam left, Steve glanced down at the phone in his hand. He was starting to feel like his own secretary.

Suddenly, the phone rang. He jumped. No, it was just Wanda, he reassured himself. That was what made the most sense. But he didn’t recognize the number. Way too many digits. He answered, warily, “Hello?”

“How long have you been carrying around that same phone?”

“Nat.” Steve felt both more anxious and relieved. They hadn’t spoken since before Bucky had made his choice.

“I taught you better than that, Steve.”

“Well, but this number--”

“It’s the one you programmed into Tony’s phone. I know.”

“Why do I feel like you didn’t just call to scold me for being sloppy?”

“Actually, I did.”

“Nice to hear from you, too.” Over all, he liked the big sister thing Nat did with him. Annoying as it was.

“I got word you were kicking around New York alone, and I wondered why.” Steve didn’t say anything. He knew the other shoe would drop.

“I can’t believe you let him do it. After everything we went through.” Her voice was tight, clipped. She was mad.

“How did you find out--?”

“I know you didn’t just ask me that.”

“Okay.” Steve really should have known by now, there was no keeping intel from Nat. “Fair enough.”

“Why, Steve? You gave up your whole life to have him back.”

Steve could feel the tears clawing at the back of his throat. But he’d gotten better and better at swallowing them down. “It’s what he wanted.” His voice was only a little hoarse.

There was a brief silence on the other end. In his mind, he could hear Peggy’s voice. _“Allow Barnes the dignity of his choice.”_

“Is this some 1940’s machismo bullshit?”

Steve couldn’t help but bristle at that. “No--you wouldn’t understand.”

“I wouldn’t understand what? That the reason you’ve been avoiding asking Sharon out for the last two years is now in the freezer section of your local supermarket?”

“Please, Nat. It was hard for me.” And how far short words fell from actually describing the hell he had gone through when Bucky asked to be put to sleep again. That he was still going through.

“I know, Steve.” And now her voice was sympathetic. “You two deserve each other. You’re both idiots.”

“It’s not like that, Nat--”

“All right. You wanna play it like that? Captain America hasn’t been in love with a man for 80 years. That’d look bad, right?”

Why was she cutting him to the bone now? Why now? “I didn’t say that.” He’d planned to come out publicly. He really had. He and Tony had even talked about it.

“It’s your life, Steve. It just hurts to see you flushing it down the toilet like this. And you can’t tell me Sam was okay with Barnes going back into deep-freeze instead of dealing with his trauma.”

“Sam...disagreed.” To put it mildly. It was the argument between them that would never die.

Nat’s voice suddenly got very quiet. When she told whole-truths, they were always like whispers from deep inside her. “If I could bring back any of those girls from the Red Room...I wouldn’t waste my chance.”  

Steve wanted to say it was different, that Bucky was everything to him, not just someone he’d trained with. But then a thought occurred to him. Maybe those girls...maybe one of them had been to Nat what Bucky was to him.

He’d never thought about it before. Her sexuality was something she’d always used as a weapon. Steve didn’t even notice it anymore, because he knew that’s all it was to her. He’d never considered it might be completely fabricated to serve a purpose. “Nat.” Something about that struck him to his core. Steve had no words.

“He really does look pretty under glass.” She sounded wistful. “Like a sleeping beauty.”

“Wait. You’re there?” Alarms were going off in Steve’s head. His heart jumped into his throat.

“Relax, Rogers. I’m on your side, remember?”

“Please, Nat. Please don’t tell Tony.”

“The last time I saw Tony, he threatened me. I put him in time out. He’s gonna have to figure out his own shit for a while.”

Steve felt bad, but. He’d come to the same conclusion on his own. Tony wasn’t his problem anymore. He couldn’t be. Not after what he’d done to Bucky. “Yeah.”

“Don’t feel bad, Steve.”

“I really lost it with him, Nat.”

“I saw that footage. He was out of his mind. He needs help, Steve. From a professional.”

“I know.” Steve conceded reluctantly.

“And he hurt your boo. No one hurts Steve Rogers’ boo.”

He had to laugh a little. It sounded so ridiculous. “It was still wrong, Nat.”

“You’re really good at that, you know?”

“What?” he asked, warily.

“Beating yourself up.” He really had nothing to say to that. It was the kind of thing Buck would have said. “Just remember there are people here who love you. Be a little kind to yourself...for us. Okay?”

Here. Was she talking about there in Wakanda? Was ‘us’ her and Bucky? It was weird, to put them both together in one category. He’d never thought to before. But they were both his friends. And he knew Nat would protect Bucky as long as she was there. It was a comfort to know two of the best assassins in the world were watching over your best pal. “Okay.”

“I’ll be here till you get back.”

“Thanks, Nat.”

“You said you wanted a friend.”

“I’m glad you asked.”

“Me, too.” Her voice was tender, sincere. Steve loved seeing Nat’s true face. It was so rare. She hung up.

Sam returned with his glass of water, to find Steve staring thoughtfully at his phone. “So what’d he say?”

“That was Nat.”

“So is it good news or bad news?” Sam asked.

“She found Buck.”

“So...bad news.”

Steve took a deep breath. “She took your side.”

“Of course she did.” Sam put the water down on a side table. “She knows what’s up.”

Steve shook his head. Two to one was worse odds. “Anyway. She said she’d stay there with him till I get back.”

“Because the superhero king of Wakanda can’t do a good enough job of protecting Mr. Freeze? Hold on, that was a stupid question.”

“It’s Nat,” Steve agreed. “I didn’t get a chance to tell her about the Thor situation.”

“You didn’t get the chance, or you didn’t tell her because she volunteered for Protect Bucky duty?”

Steve tried to be completely honest with Sam. He always figured it out anyway. “Not sure.”

“All right.” Sam patted his shoulder, then left his hand there. “Well, we’ll try Pym first. Maybe we won’t need to take her off duty.”

Steve looked up at him. “Thanks for understanding, Sam.”

“You know I always got your six.” He gave Steve’s shoulder a squeeze. “I’ll be downstairs with the ladies if you need me.”

Steve listened to him go and then dialed the number on the match box. It rang. And rang. Steve was just about to hang up when a voice came on. “Heeeeeeey, bro. How can I help you?”

“Um...hello?” The easy familiarity of the stranger on the other end was confusing. Steve was still having trouble getting used to the informal way people answered the telephone these days. “I’m looking for Scott Lang.”

“Aw, man, Scotty don’t live here no more. Now you just reminded me, it’s like a knife in my heart, bro. I miss ‘im. Do you ever just got a friend who’s so close he’s like your for real brother? That’s me and Scotty. But he got the sweet hookup now, man.”

Steve wasn’t really sure where to insert words into this one-man conversation. “He does?”

“Yeah, bro, it’s like--hold up, hold up--who’s askin’?”

“Um.” _Think of an alias. Something clever, like Sam would do. Think, Steve, think!_ “It’s...Steve.”

“Awright, Steve, what up? I’m Luis. How you know my boy Scotty?”

Steve was just fresh out of intelligent responses today. He blamed those women. And Nat. “Oh, we...he helped me with a job, once.”

“No way, you’re one of us? I had no idea, man. Scotty never told me about you. So what is it, you got another job?”

Steve was starting to suspect he’d said the wrong thing. “Umm. Can you just have him call me?”

“Oh yeah, of course, bro, I can tell you’re legit. I got your number blocked on this side. You wouldn’t just be tellin’ me your business; I respect that. Hit me up with your digits, dawg.”

Steve had to think about it for a moment to understand what the man was saying. He gave him the burner phone’s number. Another reason Nat would have said it was time to ditch it. Burner phones were supposed to be a three call max. Only one incoming. “All right, bro, I got you. I’ll get the message to Scotty ay-sap.”

“Appreciate it.” Steve hung up. Had that been a mistake? Had he called the wrong number? They’d gone through so much trouble to contact Lang last time. And that time he hadn’t been an escapee from the Raft. Maybe they should have just contacted Pym directly. But they’d had no contact with him thus far. And you couldn’t exactly call Hank Pym’s home phone and just say, ‘Hi, I’m Captain America.’ At least, not since Vienna.

But it had been worth it. Not being part of the Avengers anymore, not being able to move around freely for fear of being recognized, it was a small price to pay to have Bucky back. Or…

He thought over his conversation with Nat. In a way, at least, he did have Bucky back. The important thing was he was alive. That had been Steve’s primary goal, and he’d accomplished it. At great cost. Steve sighed, sitting back in the chair and wishing that glass of water was a beer.

“Hey, subway guy.” Thor-who-was-called-Kevin smiled down at him. Steve hadn’t even heard him climbing the stairs. He extended a bottle to Steve. “Beer?” Steve’s eyes narrowed. Now that was just plain odd.  

“You ask me, that’s the real red flag.” Sam was leaning in the doorway behind them. He twisted the cap off his own beer. “You tellin me there’d still be beer left in that fridge if the real Thor lived here?”

“I like beer,” Kevin grinned. “Tickles the back of my nose.”

“Do you ever get drunk?” Steve asked, testing a theory.

“Do you?” Kevin was still smiling his happiest puppy-dog smile. He looked genuinely interested.

 _Are you trapped inside there somewhere, buddy?_ Steve thought. _Is this your way of trying to communicate?_ He looked at Sam, to see if he was thinking the same thing.

“The lights are on.” Sam gestured with his beer. “But nobody’s home, man. Lookit ‘im.”

Kevin had picked up the matchbook and was trying to light one of the matches from the wrong end. _Don’t worry, pal._ Steve silently promised _. We’re here to help._


End file.
